Torque

This is the heavy heavy monster sound! Relentlessly blaring, layered bass riffs, ear-splitting distortion, disorienting, splintering drums, pounding cyborg warrior-two step stomps - all the indgredients of classic techstep are firmly in place on No U-Turns first label compilation. It wouldn't be long before techstep turned into its own parody, full of clichés and corny angstiness. On this release from 1997 the sound was still fresh though and the trio of Ed Rush, Nico and DJ Trace handled it with malicious, skunked-out imagination. For better or for worse, No U-Turn proved to be hugely influential on the direction d'n'b would take in the following years (and don't even get me started on techstep's ugly children hard step and dark step). But this double-disc is the real deal: dirty, poisonous, corrosive alien-funk.

Disc 1
Disc 2